Surrender to Me (The Derrings #4)(71)

She flexed her fingers around the handle of her valise, her palms growing slippery with perspiration.

His eyes drilled into her with an intensity she could not decipher, burning a hole straight through her. Surely he was not angry over her words, not when he intended to marry Petra. Why should he care if she left?

“No one seemed to give a damn about what I had to say.” Although he addressed his grandfathers, his eyes spoke to her, sharp with accusation, conveying that he thought she shared in that charge.

And he was correct. She had not considered him. Or Petra. Just as she had not considered or trusted Portia all those years ago.

And yet she had changed, had become a different woman in loving him. She helped Petra escape, after all.

Longing seized her, a deep yearning to confide to him that she had awakened at last. As though emerging from a dream. She understood it was not her place to make decisions for Griffin. Or anyone. The only person in the world whose happiness she could control was her own. And for the first time in memory, she actually believed she deserved happiness. Would not settle for less.

“What are you talking about?” Gallagher demanded with a puff of his barrel chest.

“I did not leave to fetch the reverend for me and Petra.” His gaze remained trained on her with unswerving focus.

Both his grandfathers exchanged befuddled looks.

“I fetched the reverend so that Petra might marry the man she wants to marry.”

“You,” MacFadden quickly supplied with an impatient wave of his hand. “The lass agreed to marry you.”

“Agreed,” Griffin echoed, nodding. “A bit different from want, is it not? She may have agreed to wed me, but she wanted to marry Andrew.”

“Andrew?” Gallagher scratched his thick beard. “Who the devil is Andrew?”

“You had no right,” Osborn bellowed. “Such a decision falls to me and I say my daughter will not marry a servant.”

“Who is this Andrew?” MacFadden’s confused gaze shot back and forth between Griffin and Osborn.

“A good man who loves and wants to marry Petra,” Astrid volunteered. “He doesn’t care what happened to her,” she added, hoping that conveyed just how honorable his intentions ran. Petra’s family should be relieved that such a man wanted to marry her, but Astrid knew enough about the ambitions of men to know that it would matter little…if at all. No doubt Griffin’s revelation would send the entire MacFadden clan thundering after Petra. Her shoulders slumped. She and Andrew would never reach Glasgow.

“I knew you had something to do with this,” Osborn exploded, slamming his fist into his palm as if he wished it were her.

Griffin looked at her strangely, head cocked. “You knew about Petra and Andrew?”

Raising her chin, she decided the time had arrived for Griffin to see she wasn’t the same woman he had met on a Scottish roadside. Someone afraid to live. Afraid to surrender her heart lest she become as lost and pitiable as her mother.

“I did. And I provided a distraction yesterday so that they could escape.”

“You deceitful witch!” Osborn cried.

Griffin watched her, approval glowing in his eyes. An approval she felt deep within herself, a lovely suffusing warmth.

“You knew, too. You fetched the reverend for them?” Her gaze dropped to the reverend, now sitting at the table with a pint of ale before him, watching the scene unfold as if it were a Drury Lane performance.

“Yes. I fetched the reverend for them.” Griffin stared at her one long moment before adding, “And for me.”

“You?” she asked, confused. “But you said—”

His gaze dropped to her valise. “You’re leaving.” The statement hung between them, accusatory, and yet a question lingered in his eyes.

He had not fetched the reverend so that he could wed Petra. The bewildered thought tripped through her mind. What did he mean he had fetched the reverend for him? Unsure, she took a halting step toward him.

Osborn stepped between them, blocking Griffin from her eyes, filling her vision with his hate-filled countenance.

“I’ll know where my daughter has fled this instant.”

Griffin spoke, his voice dangerous and low. “Then perhaps you should ask me.”

Osborn swung to face him. “You? How would you know? She absconded after you left.”

“Yes, but the good reverend and I happened upon Petra and Andrew on our way back here.”

“You’ve seen Petra?”

“Yes.”

By now, Osborn’s eyes bulged in his flushed face. “And you did not force them to return with you?”

“No,” Griffin answered so evenly that even Astrid began to feel exasperated. “In fact,” he added, “I wished them Godspeed on their way.”

“Where are they?” Osborn growled.

“On their way to Glasgow. Where they will board a ship bound for America.”

“America!”

“Yes.” Griffin nodded in satisfaction. “I had the good reverend marry them this very morning. And as a wedding gift, I supplied them with the means for passage.”

Chapter 26
Griffin watched as all eyes swung to Mr. Walters, seeking confirmation. The reverend raised his tankard in a cheerful salute, his easy smile quickly slipping when he caught so many dark glowers cast his way.